Mari Hunt Wassink stands for a portrait on her farm plot at Feed Iowa First’s equitable land access program in Marion on Oct. 9. Hunt Wassink uses organic and regenerative practices to grow produce culturally relevant to Black communities. (Nick Rohlman/The Gazette)

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MARION — Mari Hunt Wassink has always had a passion for social justice issues, but it wasn’t until her post graduate school plans were “scattered” by the pandemic that she pivoted to a career that allows her to work to expand social equity throughout Eastern Iowa.

After graduating from Coe College in 2017 with a degree in history and Spanish, Hunt Wassink began work in the education and nonprofit space.

In 2020, as she was preparing to return to school to pursue a postgraduate degree, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and Hunt Wassink was forced to pivot.

She started volunteering at a farm in Iowa City, working through the Community Supported Agriculture program — commonly known as CSA — where she was able to work a few hours each week in exchange for fresh produce.

Hunt Wassink said while her work at the Iowa City farm started as a way to save money, it ended up being a “really transformative experience.”

After three years spent working on other producers’ farms in the region, engaging in apprenticeship programs in Johnson County, and completing the Practical Farmers of Iowa’s Beginning Farmers training, Hunt Wassink launched Black Earth Gardens, where she grows organic produce using regenerative practices on her half-acre plot of land in Marion.

Combining her passions for racial justice, equity and farming, Hunt Wassink has created a niche by growing produce that isn’t typically found in Iowa.

“I specialize in growing things that are hard to find around here and that are culturally important to Black communities in Eastern Iowa,” she said. Some of that produce includes okra, collard greens, mustard greens and hot peppers.

With the “racial justice that was happening in 2020, I was slowly realizing over the course of that summer that I had actually found my calling in doing farming in a way that would improve equity within the local community,” Hunt Wassink said.

Mari Hunt Wassink talks with The Gazette as she harvests okra on her farm plot at Feed Iowa First’s equitable land access program in Marion on Oct. 9. Hunt Wassink uses organic and regenerative practices to grow produce culturally relevant to Black communities. (Nick Rohlman/The Gazette)

Building her business model

Hunt Wassink operates her farming practice and business on three key pillars: engaging with regenerative farming, expanding food sovereignty, and increasing food access in the region.

With regenerative farming specifically, Hunt Wassink said she works to not only sustain soil health on her farm but actually increase it while she grows her produce each season.

“If you think of soil health as kind of like a graph like extractive methods of farming deplete the soil health over time. Sustainable farming puts in as much (nutrients) as you're taking out, so it's like a steady line, horizontal line,” she said. “But regenerative farming is going up, so it's improving soil health over time. You're still harvesting something from the land, but you're adding more than what you're taking away from it.”

Hunt Wassink said one way she works to improve soil health is by implementing cover crops on the land she farms. Every fall, she plants oats or winter rye — or sometimes both — in the fields that she tills in the spring before planting again.

Mari Hunt Wassink holds a fish pepper on her farm plot at Feed Iowa First’s equitable land access program in Marion on Oct. 9. The fish pepper is a rare heirloom variety of chile pepper used by black chefs in Baltimore. The pepper turns from white, to green, to red as it ripens. Traditionally the white peppers were used with cream based sauces and seafood stews to add heat without changing the color of the dish. (Nick Rohlman/The Gazette) — Mari Hunt Wassink holds a fish pepper on her farm plot at Feed Iowa First’s equitable land access program in Marion on Oct. 9. The fish pepper is a rare heirloom variety of chili pepper used by Black chefs in Baltimore. The pepper turns from white, to green, to red as it ripens. Traditionally the white peppers were used with cream based sauces and seafood stews to add heat without changing the color of the dish. (Nick Rohlman/The Gazette)

Cover crops “increase the organic matter in the soil, which adds nutrients to the soil without applying chemical fertilizers, improves the soil's ability to retain water, and sequesters carbon from the atmosphere,” Hunt Wassink said. “It holds the soil in place over the winter, preventing soil erosion and nutrient runoff from snowmelts, rainfall and wind.”

Hunt Wassink said that growing culturally important food goes along with food sovereignty and food access, noting that she wants anyone to be able to purchase her produce.

Mari Hunt Wassink harvests okra on her farm plot at Feed Iowa First’s equitable land access program, in Marion on Oct. 9. Hunt Wassink uses organic and regenerative practices to grow produce culturally relevant to Black communities. (Nick Rohlman/The Gazette)

Black Earth Gardens “makes sure that everyone in the community has access to the food that I'm growing, regardless of how much money they make or what neighborhood they're living in,” Hunt Wassink said. “So, I use creative marketing strategies to make sure that my produce is affordable to everyone.”

For example, Hunt Wassink said she uses a sliding scale pay system with her CSA program, so customers can opt in at different levels. She also offers discounts to customers who are paying with SNAP cards, to help practice the “social justice piece” of her business model.

In partnership with the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship, she also organizes a mobile market that travels to different senior living homes around the county.

Hunt Wassink said the mobile market serves seniors who use Market Nutrition Program vouchers, which are given to seniors who fall below a certain income level in Iowa.

Oftentimes, seniors are only able to redeem these vouchers at farmers markets, rather than larger chain grocery stores. She said that many of the seniors also have mobility issues, which makes it difficult for them to travel to farmers markets.

“What we've done is bring the market to them,” Hunt Wassink said. “We literally go to senior living centers and set up our farm stands in their parking lot, so people can come out and shop and they can use their vouchers.”

She said SNAP EBT credits also are accepted at the mobile markets, along with cash, card and checks.

“I see it as a win-win because it's good for us because we're making sales, but it's also good for the seniors, because they're getting better access to fresh, locally-grown produce,” she said. “It also keeps those dollars circulating in the local economy.”

Hunt Wassink said she also sells her produce and herbs at farmers markets and to food pantries in the area.

Looking to expand

Currently, Hunt Wassink runs Black Earth Gardens through the nonprofit Feed Iowa First’s Equitable Land Access Program, which works to connect aspiring Iowa farmers with land, resources and training to help reduce startup costs and help launch the farmer’s agricultural operation.

With only a few months left in the three-year program, Hunt Wassink is now working to expand her farming operation and find it a permanent home, although it hasn’t been easy.

“Farmland access is the number one problem that young farmers face in this country, and it's definitely been true for me,” she said. “I didn't grow up on a farm, and there's no farmland in my family, so I don't have farmland to inherit. So, getting into farming is really challenging if you don't already have the infrastructure to be able to start, especially in Iowa, as an agricultural state.”

Hunt Wassink said one hurdle vegetable farmers face is finding land connected to a well or municipal water system for irrigation purposes. She said vegetable farmers also need access to coolers to store produce.

Mari Hunt Wassink holds okra on her farm plot at Feed Iowa First’s equitable land access program, in Marion on Oct. 9. Hunt Wassink uses organic and regenerative practices to grow produce culturally relevant to Black communities. (Nick Rohlman/The Gazette)

“If those things aren't already in place, you can't just walk onto a plot of corn and soybean ground and expect to be able to do vegetable farming there,” she said. “You could buy a piece of land like that, but you would have to anticipate in investing a lot of infrastructure before you would be able to reap a vegetable harvest from that land.”

Hunt Wassink said she is currently looking for land within an hour of Cedar Rapids and Iowa City for her permanent farm operation.

To help with that purchase, Hunt Wassink won the first place prize of $7,500 at this year’s EntreFEST pitch competition in June.

Mari Hunt Wassink, owner of Black Earth Gardens, tells community members and judges about her business during EntreFEST at Big Grove Brewery in southeast Cedar Rapids on June 13. Black Earth Gardens currently has a half acre of land, and is able to feed 20 families through produce boxes as well as make wholesale orders. Hunt Wassink won first place in the pitch competition. (Elizabeth Wood/The Gazette)

At the competition, Hunt Wassink said she pitched her business using her three key pillars, and spoke about how she puts them to use in her business model.

Despite the challenge of accessing land and land prices, Hunt Wassink said she fell in love with farming because of how it can be an avenue for healing.

“I really believe that part of why I became a farmer was that I really have come to believe in the power of farming as a tool for healing our bodies, healing our communities and healing our ecosystems,” she said. Farming “is this holistic way of getting at all of those things.”

Olivia Cohen covers energy and environment for The Gazette and is a corps member with Report for America, a national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on under-covered issues. She is also a contributing writer for the Ag and Water Desk, an independent journalism collaborative focusing on the Mississippi River Basin.

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Comments: olivia.cohen@thegazette.com

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